Having owned both the 7520 and HP50, I'd encourage you to trythe 7520. It is easy to drive from an ipod and does have a wow factor. The same can be said for the HP50...but the looks of it are odd. I think the 7520 is a better fit for those genres though. I haven't heard the P7...but if I really cared about looks, I'd try it. From all the reviews, it should satisfy your needs.

@Ikarios Try to take the cups down a notch or two, it will sligthly weaken the clamping side force and will allow the cups to be less vertical and a little bit more diagonal thus weaken pressure against your upper ear (helix).

About the the mids you expected a 7506 kinda sound which is not what the 7520 is.

And I don't recall a post in this thread stating that the 7520 is a better 7506,

if I'm not wrong Mike F talked about it quite a bit saying that they are quite different sounding or maybe ti was the 7509...

Anyway after checking the 7506 freq response

it seems that I was right about my assumption that they have a bump in upperbass lower mids making voices sounding more authoritative/throaty.

No matter how long you will burn the 7520 you will not have those 7506 mids, But the good thing is that you could simply use EQ to achieve it quite easily then you might have a 7506 with better base.A 5db bump at 500hz and a 1db or 2db bump at 1000hz will be a good start for perfecting your equalization if you have control over Q's and specific freqs in your EQ will even be better.

Of course IMO comfort issue is a deal-breaker if it can't be overcome no matter how good a Headphone might sound it will always tinker with your mind and not allow you to truly appreciate its sound.

I think it has already been said in this thread, but just in case there's any doubt I will state that (IMO of course) the 7520 is in a totally different class to the 7506. The 7506 is an excellent monitoring hp, but the 7520 is a high class audio tool for critical listening and mixing. The 7509HD is/was a similar class of hp but with different voicing and build quality.

Having owned both the 7520 and HP50, I'd encourage you to trythe 7520. It is easy to drive from an ipod and does have a wow factor. The same can be said for the HP50...but the looks of it are odd. I think the 7520 is a better fit for those genres though. I haven't heard the P7...but if I really cared about looks, I'd try it. From all the reviews, it should satisfy your needs.

My only complaint about the 7520 is the comfort of the pads could use a bit more cushion and clearance between the driver and ear. Sound quality is amazing for a headphone of twice the price and build quality is also outstanding, very light yet durable and elegant. The included cord is a joke and so you will need to pick up a decent light weight cord on amazon for portable use but having 3/5mm female on the headphone side makes the options unlimited and there is absolutely no difficulty in exchanging cords as often as you like. Efficiency though is what makes the 7520 the clear portable winner in my opinion. It easily puts out on volume 2 what others do at 6 and with plenty of bass and mid drive which brings life to voices and electric guitars yet still maintaining a very flat and controlled output, no bass slop no sibilance. I think for the genre of music you are considering using them for they can't be beat.

To offset the pad thickness I have recently been considering buying a sinple sheet of neoprene via amazon and cutting some rings to insert behind the pads. If I do this and they work (can't see why it wouldn't) I would be glad to make a dozen more from the rest of the sheet and ship them to any 7520 owners. PM me if interested and if enough people speak up I will purchase a sheet and start finding the fit.

My only complaint about the 7520 is the comfort of the pads could use a bit more cushion and clearance between the driver and ear. Sound quality is amazing for a headphone of twice the price and build quality is also outstanding, very light yet durable and elegant. The included cord is a joke and so you will need to pick up a decent light weight cord on amazon for portable use but having 3/5mm female on the headphone side makes the options unlimited and there is absolutely no difficulty in exchanging cords as often as you like. Efficiency though is what makes the 7520 the clear portable winner in my opinion. It easily puts out on volume 2 what others do at 6 and with plenty of bass and mid drive which brings life to voices and electric guitars yet still maintaining a very flat and controlled output, no bass slop no sibilance. I think for the genre of music you are considering using them for they can't be beat.

To offset the pad thickness I have recently been considering buying a sinple sheet of neoprene via amazon and cutting some rings to insert behind the pads. If I do this and they work (can't see why it wouldn't) I would be glad to make a dozen more from the rest of the sheet and ship them to any 7520 owners. PM me if interested and if enough people speak up I will purchase a sheet and start finding the fit.

I haven't had problems with comfort and my ear slips behind the cup fine. I've been wearing them for hours without problems. The high sensitivity of the 7520 is one of its best features and can be easily driven out of portable devices. They make a great closed headphone for portable usage.

I haven't had problems with comfort and my ear slips behind the cup fine. I've been wearing them for hours without problems. The high sensitivity of the 7520 is one of its best features and can be easily driven out of portable devices. They make a great closed headphone for portable usage.

I wouldn't be selling them if it wasn't for my current need for IEMs with very high noise isolation. For a closed headphone they are exactly what I want at that price. Excellent clarity, superb imaging for binaural audio and gaming and a nice full bass. I've got this sinking feeling though that I'd end up buying another pair in the future but at this time I need the money for IEMs.

Typhoon I think the 7520's are great for that kind of music, which is mostly what I listen to (90's death, black, thrash, and some older and more recent stuff as well). They're extremely comfortable, no issues for me, and don't need an amp but can get even fuller with one, in my experience. As for the cord, it's true that it's a coiled pain, but that's only if you don't like coils, which I don't.

I'd say don't go to Amazon, but get a high-quality 3.5mm-to-3.5mm cable from a Chinese maker. Some of those small hi-fi outfits in China are doing great work. You can find them on eBay with a little searching. For $12 shipped, I'm getting a custom-length Canare (Japanese-made) cable with a Pailiccs jack on the HP end, and a smaller Chinese-subcontracted Neutrik jack on the source end. It's basically a combination of the D11 and D02 model from this guy, without the fabric sheathing so that it's more flexible:

So will those fat plug housings (correct term? lol) fit in the 7520? I remember reading in this thread that if the plug (not the 1/8" part, but the housing) was too large it wouldn't work. Those cables look nice for the price.

Originally Posted by campj So will those fat plug housings (correct term? lol) fit in the 7520?

I honestly don't know yet, but I did a photoshop resize/rotate operation on a bunch of photos of jacks, including the 7520 HP end, including overlaying drawn shapes to compare, etc., and I'm 95% sure it will fit, with just a little room to spare. I wanted as fat a jack as possible up there, without making contact with the sides. If you want to spend more money, look at the Rode MiCon-8, which is a 3.5mm jack with a locking thread, and I'm pretty sure it will fit, because the threads on the headphone seem to be the same setup as the threads on the Sony UWP wireless microphone series (where the lavalier mic plugs into the transmitter). The Rode MiCon-8 is the high-end jack for that application, with those Sony mics. I wanted to try that jack, but it would be too much money, and the locking thing isn't really necessary in my view, unless I'm being obsessive about it. Obviously, I'll let you know for sure about the fit when the cable comes.

All I can say is give them a really good burn in (150-200hrs), and then give them a good listen allowing your self time to adjust to the sound. The bass improves a lot becoming much tighter and cleaner and then the whole spectrum seems to fall into place. I find them to be very fast, accurate and detailed (and at times sibilant if it's present on the recording) but at the same time dark and musical. A very unusual combination.

You are correct.
I burned mine for 3weeks but I think it was done after the second week..